Sock Journal

Weather-wise, in the Portland area November stops being fall and starts being winter abruptly and wetly. The darkening skies of incoming winter storms mean grey is the perfect colour to focus on this month.

More often than not called “silver”, “charcoal”, “graphite”, “anthracite” or “slate”, grey is a wonderful neutral that stays surprisingly neutral (though some styles tend more blue or yellow). A mutable hue, it’s greatly affected by what it is next to, like these O Chevrons (and an A Chevron) show for our Dream Stockings in Grey and in Charcoal.

Grey falls into about three categories: light, medium and dark, as you can see by how I sorted out my bins of examples.

Disclaimer time! I’m not trying to define grey. If you want some poem-like lists of names for shades of grey, both Wikipedia and the Color Sorting Wiki are kind of amazing resources. I’ve done my best to accurately represent these hues in relation to each other, so you can gather a good idea of what matches and what doesn’t. There are a lot of greys from our suppliers, so I’m not going to clutter your monitor with all of them, just representative examples.

Dream Stockings and Dreamer Socks

We have a pretty lovely range of grey, if I say so myself! From light to dark, we’ve got ‘em in lots of different fibers (including the Dreamer Acrylic Slouch Socks in Silver Grey that I forgot to add here)!

Okay, for real now, it’s leg warmer season. My ankles are cold and after a couple of days of complaining about it I remembered all the leg warmers I have exactly for this season. I think most folks don’t consider leg warmers as a dated fashion accessory any more, they’re just a perfect way to stop drafts between your shoe and pants, or to add another layer over leggings or under boots.

How much leg warmer you want is going to vary though. How much scrunch can you handle? Do you need ‘em to go up as high as they can for extra cold mornings? Are they going over pants or bare legs and tights? Well, we have two styles that each have two coverage levels that might just be exactly what you’re looking for.

With a stretch of 21 inches at the “top” cuff, the longer version is good option for slimmer thighs that would like their leg warmers to stay up. The shorties have a 22 inch stretch throughout and are great for folks with shorter inseams who just don’t want that much legwarmer and fuller calves that want a leg warmer without all the extra length. They also make a great sleeve-style arm warmer!

Ribbed Knit Leg Warmers

A Foot Traffic classic, they come in the 40 inch Super Long Ribbed Leg Warmers and the shorter Ribbed Knit Leg Warmers, which are 20 inches long. Fuzzy in texture, they’re 70% acrylic, which means they dry fast, so they’re awesome in snowy or rainy weather. A couple of the colours are available in both lengths, but the long version has some new, ultra-delicious options that we’re in love with.

The Super Long Ribbed have one cuff that is tighter, stretching to only 25 inches (24 for the Charcoal), the body and cuff at the other end stretch to 30 inches! The shorter version have less stretch, with 20 inches at the tighter cuff, 27 inches at the other cuff and 29 inches in the body of the leg warmer.

Now, let’s compare!

Or, if I may, let’s see how they stack up against each other. . .

Both styles, as you may have noticed from my descriptions, have a tighter cuff and a looser cuff. The tighter cuff is supposed to be the “top”, and is tighter because of the thin bands of elastic threaded through the top row of stitches.

The “bottom” cuff is just the finished, ruffly end of the legwarmer itself, so it has practically the same stretch as the rest of the warmer—uninhibited by elastic’s rules, man.

And you too can reject what’s supposed to be up or down and wear them as you will! Most ankles are narrower than calves and thighs, so it works out well to have the less stretchy bit down there. Keep in mind, though, that the stretchier end has little stay-up power and will need to be paired with a sock garter like the Simply Adjustables to stay up through your day.

Texture-wise, the ribbed knit legwarmers are fuzzy, wuzzy and (for some folks) a little itchy when worn against thin tights or bare skin. Due to their killer stretch, that works out well, as they are AMAZING over pants and a lot of legs find they will go even over jeans.

The Scrunchables are a thinner cotton and a little snugger. So they have a sleeker look, both in texture and how they fit against and over you. I personally find them less than ideal to go over trousers, but they are perfect over tights and leggings.

So, two different leg warmers that are also very similar. Between them, four singular styles to select from to keep those ankles draft-free and to add another layer of warmth as we snowball into winter!

Halloween might be one of our favourite times of year here at Sock Dreams. It’s one of the reasons why our Halloween category is easy to find year-round. Normally by now on the Sock Journal I’d have talked at least once about costumes and given you ideas, but all of you are clearly on top of it this year! We’ve seen so many cool combos of styles go out this month, you all are really making our season.

Since this year was full of some fabulously Halloween-riffic new styles, let’s just revel in a bit of Halloween trend goodness on this day o’ spooky and costumes. Some are out of stock at the moment (due to this being the season they’re most in demand) but, if you’re anything like a lot of us Dreamers, the visual themes of Halloween aren’t limited to one month of the year, so we’re sure you’ll find a use even in spring time for . . .

Okay, I’m going to close with a real nerdy thing. I noticed this year that black and orange aren’t the hot Halloween colours. Both in what people are buying and what I’ve seen out and about. So I made some pretty ridiculous graphs of our two big Halloween brands because I know y’all are nerds too.

Remember, seeing how you use our socks in your costumes gives us undead creatures of the night life! Tag us on Tumbr, share with us on Facebook, give us a virtual trick-or-treat of how awesome you all are. ♥

Have a happy Halloween and may your evening’s celebrations be bountiful!

October! A time of magic and mystery and cooling weather. There’s no better month for the original Dreamer, Niq, to be born! The founder and President of Sock Dreams, she’s probably got the hardest time of all of us trying to pick a favourite sock to recommend to you all this month.

A long time ago, though, when she was the one writing the Sock Journal, Niq posted a sock of the day (or other sort of little updates). So she’s had her toes in just about every style we carry and have carried! That’s a lot of sock memory that can cloud up what one’s current fave style is.

To buy her some time, let’s look at some old favourites from Niq’s daily sock postings that we still carry. Because oldies are goodies and I’m forever thankful that not all socks are seasonal!

And, it’s another one of our delicious Dream Stockings that Niq picked for her current fave! Here’s what she says:

Narrowing my favorite socks down to a single pair was not an easy task for me but the Super Dreamy won out because they’re like a security blanket for my legs and feet, comforting all the way to my soles. I love them for traveling, especially during the chillier months, because they layer well and can turn a tank top or t-shirt into a perfect pair of pajamas that can also double as a great base for my daywear.

Most truthfully, her current favourite are a pair of Cronert that aren’t live yet. But that’s par for the course, Cronert’s deliciously soft cotton and lovely patterns are Niq’s kryptonite and have been for a long time. The Elliot Anklet is another favourite, with the sweet scalloped cuff and florals. One more that she loves and misses (and we hope is something we can restock soon!) are the Tentacle Boot Socks, made specially for us by Raygun Robyn.

So, a happy birthday month to the reason you’re here shopping and we’re here socking (and to all you other October babies)!

We’ve gone through all the main colours this year in our monthly focus posts and now with black under our belts, let’s take this colour matching to the next level: matching stripes across brands and styles! It’s something we see a lot of you folks doing as you put the final touches on your Halloween costumes, so I figured it’d be timely to talk about it now.

As we’ve learned, if you want to keep your colours matching, it’s best to stay within a brand or style, particularly in the Dream Stockings, since we use the same yarn for each colour. So, naturally, the M Sleeves and the Super Warmers short or long, match their corresponding colours in the Color Knees and Super Stripes (with some cross-pollination between all of those styles, plus the Neapolitans and Rainbow Dreams!).

But what about rainbows, or black/purple and black/red? What if your perfect sock to match your arm warmers is made of a totally different fiber? Well, we have good news and bad news, depending on what colours you’re talking about.

Curious about us?

Sock Dreams was born in Portland Oregon in the Fall of 2000. We at Sock Dreams are a unique & quirky bunch of individuals who value diversity as much as we value comfy socks and great customer service. Our customers come in many sizes, shapes, genders, etc... and so do we.